May 17 Weekend Rides

[Catrin]

I KNOW there are others riding, and far more than I, so I will start.

Rolled out of my front door into a foggy morning, just after it was light enough to be considered "day", with all lights and blinkers going. After tweaking my grips a bit, I duplicated my ride from Monday and while one of my traps were complaining a bit, I didn't have the strange nerve pain in my forearm. My fit still needs addressed I think, but it was nice to see my efforts made a difference.

Lovely 14.5 mile ride though an empty park - lots of deer sightings, and I mean a LOT! It was beautiful riding on the road through the woods and seeing streams of sunlight cutting through the fog in the woods - it was worthy of a painting - but I didn't stop to take a picture. It was enough to enjoy it and let it go.

[thekarens]

Yesterday while my partner was mountain biking I decided to join our club out on a road ride. I ride with the no drop group. About 7 miles in we always regroup and the leader always says, "now is the time to start thinking about whether you want to do 20, 25, 35 or 40 miles. Normally I'm lazy and do 25. But this time Barb, one of the great ladies in the club, looked at me and told me, you're doing 35. Since I had been so informed 35 it was.

I was glad I did it. This route had more country roads and less feeder roads. There were still pretty wildflowers along the route. The only bad part was we had a head wind on the way back. Still, I managed an average of almost 14 mph. Traveling time was 2.5 hours. There was 40 minutes of regroups and one rest stop.

[Crankin]

I am trying to get myself ready for a hilly metric on June 9th. Much to my distaste (and usual course of action), because it is still earlier in the season than I would usually do something like this, I've been semi-training. Yesterday I did a 50 mile ride (first of the year) to Bolton Country Store with my DH.The way there is very hilly, and we were very conservative in our speed. It's almost exactly 25 miles to the orchard by the way we ride, and we had a sandwich there, deciding to skip the ice cream, for obvious reasons. The way back features a 3 mile climb of a moderate grade almost immediately after leaving the store, and it's unshaded. Thankfully, it was partly cloudy out, as it was about 75 and I am just starting to acclimate to the warmer temperatures. Once we got into Harvard Center, we stopped and rested for about 5 minutes, and then it's another short, but annoying climb to a big downhill, and then heading back through some of the local roads we usually ride on. Once we got here, we stopped and I ate the remainder of my Lara Bar. I'm trying to be better about eating and noticing my thrist/hunger. We picked up the pace a little, and when we were just about to start going up this little climb that always "gets" me near the town line of Acton and Concord, a young girl passed us, quite abruptly. Then, however, she slowed down a lot. We stayed on her wheel, as I was conserving my energy, but I think she was surprised. She turned off and we continued on toward home, through West Concord and Concord center, where we realized that we were going to be just short of 50 miles, so we rode a couple of extra miles, to achieve 50.21 miles, with 3,500 feet of climbing. Ouch. My moving average speed for the second half of the ride was 1.5 mile faster than the beginning. DH headed out to catch a plane to the UK and I went to dinner at a friend's house.
Today I met same friends at 10:30 to do the "Cycle of Sight" ride, which was a charity ride we used to do, but the Acton Lions decided it was easier to do a golf tournament to raise money! I rode 8 miles to meet them and then we set off through Sudbury, Lincoln, Wayland, and Weston, where we stop for lunch. On the way there, we ran into riders from the "family" ride on a charity ride for the Brain Tumor Society. Oy, kids weaving all over the road, and lots of adults who clearly were out of their league... I caught them when I was going up a hill and it was scary. Thankfully, by the time we finished lunch, most were done. We rode by the the start/finish of this ride and people were cheering for us, but we rode on. Anyway, the next part of this ride features a climb that I dislike intensely, mostly because I've had some bad car altercations here. That was OK, but my legs are dead today. The rest of the ride takes us through Hanscom AFB, back into Concord center, and then home. My toal was 39.6 miles today, not sure of elevation. I am really tired, but feel like I am making good progress. I've only ridden 531 miles this year, which seems like nothing, even though I've been riding pretty regularly. I did notice that today, I rode my Kuota, and because I was tired, I am missing the lower gears on my Guru. The Kuota is a triple, but has less gears on the rear than the set up on my other bike. I don't want to get too used to that, but I do use that bike on days like yesterday when I do a lot of climbing. I felt like I was struggling a little on the hills today, but I'll chalk it up to dead legs.

[Owlie]

I did 30 miles today with two of the other people from work. It was a somewhat rushed ride, since one is incapable of being on time and we were all working the morning shift. Longest ride on my own road bike this year, and my knee isn't freaking out. A good time was had by all.

[BikeDutchess]

We had signed up to ride the Cycle Salt Lake Century (the metric option) yesterday, but when we woke up it rained, and rained, and rained. So we skipped it. Didn't want a repeat of the cold & soggy Salt Lake City Marathon ride. I heard later conditions were definitely less than ideal, some folks had hypothermia. My daughter and I decided to ride the CSLC route today instead, and it was gorgeous!

Only one flat

Untitled by DutchRosie, on Flickr

And a beautiful day of riding

Untitled by DutchRosie, on Flickr

I haven't been getting my TITS this season, and I sure felt those 70 miles. I may have to rethink my Little Red distance!

[gocard]

I did a nice 26 mile ride today in the Shoreline area in perfect 70 degree weather. I've been looking for a way to get to more of the CA Bay Trail from the south bay, but I always get stopped by the gravel paths. I wish they were paved but maybe I'll have to come back with a mountain bike or look for other ways to access more of the Bay Trail on my road bike.

[AppleTree]

I did a hilly 61 mile ride with the Cascade Club training group. Started in Renton, went out to Hobart and did a loop of Mercer Island on the way back to the start. I have dreaded each and every one of these rides, and it takes everything I have to get up early and just get there, but by the time the ride is over, I'm rolling back to the car belting out a triumphant chorus of "We Are The Champions" and generally feeling pleased with myself. That feeling never lasts and soon I am dreading the next ride. Next weeks ride is 75 miles with 3600 feet of climbing and I'm already feeling that resistance building.

Are you still on your recumbent then? It must be working out well for you if you are doing 60+ miles, go you!!

I wanna hear how your next ride goes too. You can do it!

[Crankin]

Lauraelmore, I always feel that way. DH and I joke that we have a case of the "dreads," often accompanied by 3 trips to the bathroom.
In fact, DH said I should propose this as a new mental disorder, for the DSM... it happens to me even when I'm just going out alone or with a friend.

[lauraelmore1033]

Are you still on your recumbent then? It must be working out well for you if you are doing 60+ miles, go you!!

I wanna hear how your next ride goes too. You can do it!

I only ride the recumbent occasionally now. I found a good program for stretching and strengthening just the right parts and it seems to be doing the trick.

Crankin: How discouraging to hear that it doesn't get better!

[Crankin]

I don't mean to be discouraging. I've talked to lots of cyclists who experience this. I tend toward high anxiety anyway, so I just use the calming skills I teach my clients... Breathing and positive self talk.
DH only recently started feeling like this, and he is a super strong rider.

[AppleTree]

I only ride the recumbent occasionally now. I found a good program for stretching and strengthening just the right parts and it seems to be doing the trick.

Crankin: How discouraging to hear that it doesn't get better!

That is good to hear!